J-5-8

We kinda wanted to watch some crime dramas on WAVE3-TV this evening but were frustrated because the Louisville NBC affiliate is dedicated to telecasting all University of Kentucky basketball games and tonight a UK game ruled. Go 'Cats.

It passed through my mind the other day that I might watch more basketball this year. Five minutes would do it. I'd been disillusioned with the sport since Kareem was Lew Alcindor and John Wooden was coach at UCLA. And Indiana had a single class state tournament.

I do recall a world series or whatever you call it when the Celtics (Larry Bird, Robert Parrish, Kevin McHale, Tiny Archibald) beat the Lakers (Kareem, Magic). Seems I watched that in the basement of our house at 2564 Tyler in Ogden, Utah, so that's been a while.

Basketball hasn't always been a spectator sport for me. Although I wasn't good enough to make the varsity and the varsity wasn't good enough to make it out of the sectional, I played in a lot of pickup games on outdoor courts up to when I went in the Peace Corps. The thing I did best was pass the ball to the open man.

I was pretty sneaky about it. But I wasn't very graceful. Anyone remember "Ollie" of Hoosiers who dribbled the ball off his foot and out of bounds? Ich bin Ollie, Schatze. Then there was the time I nearly croaked after playing a full-court game with a bunch of old Logansport jocks and my kids on Thanksgiving.

But I liked watching the game when I was a kid. The year we won state, I had a season ticket in the Brown Gym behind the press box. The seat was in Section J, Row 5, Seat 8. I was ten, in the sixth grade. Always a fat little nerd, I made up my own spiral-bound scorebooks and kept score with a Scripto mechanical pencil. I did well for the first quarter or so but I'd get excited and forget to put down O's and X's for baskets and foul shots attempted and made. Then there were the fouls. Boy, could I have used a cam-corder!

That was a fabulous year for basketball. The MHS Cubs were a really strong team (there is no I in team, yada, yada, yada, but in this case it was really true). The teams in the sectional tournament, the first of the four competitions (sectional, regional, semifinal, final) that eliminated all but one team, were nowhere near a match for the big guys. We beat one team 103-39. The basketball was smokin'.

That sectional was spectacular. In 1950 there were 757 teams to start and most of them were in the Madison sectional. All the rural one-room schoolhouses had high schools and some kind of gym. North Madison, "Central" (Ryker's Ridge), Dupont, Deputy, Saluda, and Hanover comprised the schools of Jefferson County, and schools from other counties competed too -- Paris Crossing, Cross Plains, Lexington, Moorefield, Brooksburg, Foltz -- hell I don't know. Everybody. And what the players lacked in skill they made up for in the color of their uniforms -- one I recall had highway yellow underwear with crimson trim. And their nicknames. Well, those weren't all that inspired: Lions and Tigers and Bears and Wolves and Snakes and ... No. No snakes. Just kidding. None of the other, either. I liked the Paris Crossing Pirates. You have to go north to get some really good names: the Frankfort Hot Dogs, the Logansport Berries, the Rochester Zebras. I love that! Zebras.

The games started on Wednesday afternoon and we were out of school (!) from then through Friday. I don't remember that occurrence before or after. I think the expectation we'd win state this year was high: we'd lost in the final game last year 62-61 to Anderson and nearly all the guys from last year were back. Deadeye Dee was gone but he was well supplanted by five excellent players -- even the bench was strong. We were dismissed from school and told to go to the games to support our troops.

Freedom of speech is exciting when it's exhibited in a sweaty gym where Hoosiers are practicing the state religion. A teacher once had us imitate a crowd by half of us repeating "hubbub" over and over while the other half said "soda water bottle." That's what it sounded like there between plays and when the plays got exciting the crowd sounded like three choirs singing in round with three 32-stop organs with all stops pulled out, playing Handel's Hallelujah Chorus, Widor's Toccata, and Bach's Toccata and Fugue in d. The spectacle of all the people made it worthwhile even if you couldn't see the game. The place would get hot and they'd open the big transom windows at the tops of the bleachers. The litter of popcorn boxes and Coke cups would abuild and it was OK as long as it didn't get on the playing floor. A morose janitor with a 4' -wide fleece dustmop would go around the edges of the floor at the half.

We went on to win that year. We had another squeaker with Anderson, in the afternoon of the final four weeks after that sectional. That night we romped over Lafayette Jefferson, 67-44.

I recite these numbers from memory. My M-1 rifle's serial number (1958) was 5735825. I kid you not.